


Warmth

by Aoidos



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Huddling For Warmth, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-03
Updated: 2013-09-03
Packaged: 2017-12-25 12:54:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,066
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/953344
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aoidos/pseuds/Aoidos
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is a drabble I posted in response to a prompt about Arthur and Eames huddling for warmth. People seemed to like it, so I'm posting it here :)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Warmth

Taking a job in Russia had been an absolutely rubbish idea, which is why Eames had objected to the plan from the very start. He hates cold climates, and he’s always found Russia incredibly depressing, but Arthur had insisted the money was good, and the connections they’d make on the job would prove to be valuable. Since Inception, they’d more or less been working together exclusively, since in addition to being the world’s best forger, Eames was also a talented extractor. The partnership had thus far proven fruitful, but sometimes Arthur didn’t know when to turn down a job.

Like now, for example.

Verkhoyansk, Russia is one of the coldest places on earth, population less than 1,500 frozen souls, and Eames hates the place immediately. Naturally, the team selected the location precisely because of its isolation, but Eames decides they went a bit overboard when he finds himself navigating a truck mounted on snow chains along a road that really can’t be called a road—trail, is more like it—towards a cabin.

"Fucking hell, Arthur," he complains as soon as he sees the place, which must have been built in the 1700s. "This is bloody excessive." Though Eames has been known to grace some of the more undesirable crevices of society, he likes his five-star hotels and room service. He wonders if this place even has electricity. "How’re you going to work in this place?"

Arthur has a map unfolded in his lap and he’s examining the veins of the town’s roads closely. “This isn’t where we’re working. It’s a meet-up point. We’re waiting for Tasha and Remmy to meet us once they get in from Moscow.”

If Eames wasn’t driving, he’d glare at Arthur. “It’d be nice if you kept me abreast of these things,” he grumbles.

When he glances the point man’s way, he sees Arthur smile as he folds the map. He’s the only person alive who manages to crease the map in the exact same fashion it left the factory. “It’s just for a few hours.”

Famous last bloody words.

***

Natasha and Remmy’s flight is cancelled due to weather, mostly because Arthur chose as their rendezvous spot the coldest place known to man. Eames is still dressed in his parker, hat, gloves, scarf, and boots as he sits on the couch and watches Arthur toil away trying to build a fire in the hearth.

"Feel free to chip in whenever," the point man grouses as he fails, yet again, to create a spark with two stones and some dry grass. 

Eames has no idea what he’s trying to accomplish with all that—probably something he learned in the Boy Scouts. The old, snuggly warm Eames would have made some quip about that, along with a reference that said experience was probably only acquired a handful of years ago, since Arthur looks like he’s sixteen, if he wasn’t so buggeringly cold. His teeth are chattering, for Christ’s sake.

He stands up and walks over to the kitchen and begins exploring the cabinets. “Ah-ha!” he crows triumphantly and holds up the half-full (ever the optimist) bottle of vodka, shaking it a bit in the air. “Who needs a fire, eh?”

Arthur eyes him skeptically as he unscrews the cap and takes a gigantic swig. “Alcohol doesn’t actually make you warmer, Eames. You just won’t realize when you’re freezing to death.”

Eames licks his lips free of the alcohol, gazes at Arthur, then the bottle, then makes direct eye contact with the point man as he takes another generous drink. Arthur rolls his eyes. 

"Fine," he says, flipping open his cellphone and glaring at the screen, like he expects his reception bars to magically flare up. There’s no internet connection. There are no cellphone towers. They just have to sit here and wait for whenever the heavens decide to part and allow their architect and chemist to reach the town.

***

Arthur refuses to drink, so Eames gets tipsy on vodka all on his lonesome. The point man is being a stick in the mud, as usual, going over his notes and files, which he’s spread out on the floor. Glassy-eyed, Eames watches him from the couch.

"You don’t ever stop, do you?" he asks, eyeing the little bit of vodka left at the bottom of the bottle and recalling the old British propaganda posters from the war:  _Don’t waste it!_

Arthur caps his pen and looks up from his work. “I want to be ready to roll when they get in.”

Eames hums, unimpressed. “Talk to me like a bloody human being, you little robot. How are you? How’s your life?”

When he looks up again, the point man eyes Eames like he’s gone insane. “What do you mean?”

Eames blinks slowly and smirks.  _Christ_. “I mean, how  _are_ you? We’re friends, right?”

Arthur furrows his brows, but he nods, thankfully.

"Right, so, I’m asking  _as your friend_ about your life.” Could this really be a new concept for Arthur? Then, Eames recalls the train wreck named Dominic Cobb and mentally revises. Actually, it probably is a new concept for Arthur to be asked about how he’s doing in life.

The point man looks a bit lost for an answer before he finally responds: “I’m fine, Eames.”

Stirring conversation, to be sure. Eames sighs and uncaps the bottle again. “Still seeing that bloke, then? David Whatshisname?” 

He’d only met Arthur’s accountant boyfriend once, and he hadn’t been impressed. It had been at a Christmas party at Cobb’s place after Inception, and it had been a reunion of sorts. Yusuf had been there, Ariadne too, and of course Arthur, and Arthur had brought his boyfriend. Eames had been shocked to learn, for starters, the point man is a human being with sexual urges just like the rest of the human race, but beyond that, he didn’t approve of the arrangement. 

To be totally honest, Eames hates David because David is a bit of a prat. He’d tried to chat with the man and found it was like talking to a brick wall, and the boyfriend seemed more concerned with leaving the party early than he did with meeting Arthur’s colleagues and friends. And if Eames was to be truly sincere, he would admit he’d probably had too much to drink that night, which is why when he found Arthur and David outside on the back porch, arguing, and David stuck his finger in Arthur’s face in a terribly rude fashion, he’d shouted: “Oy! Back the fuck up, mate!” in a manner that was probably a touch too aggressive.

But could anyone blame him? David Whatshisname is a prick.

"No," Arthur says quietly and uncaps his pen again, his gaze returning to the files in front of him. 

Eames’ brows raise and he waits for an elaboration, but one never comes. “Well….good,” he says, nodding because,  _right_ , that’s good. “He doesn’t deserve you.”

Though he never looks up from his work, the corners of Arthur’s mouth slowly uptick in a smile.

***

Eames has a touch of ADD, and when self-medicating with alcohol, he has traditionally proven to be a bit of a walking disaster. 

Verkhoyansk is no exception.

He manages to sit on the couch and behave himself for about an hour before he leaps up and declares, “Right, I’m off.”

Arthur stumbles to his feet behind him, clearly stunned. “Wait, what? Where’re you going?”

"Town," Eames says vaguely. "Saw signs aways back. Getting food. M’starving, mate," he says as he plucks the keys off a small table and walks in a more or less straight line towards the door.

"Eames, you’re drunk," Arthur says as he jogs over and grabs his arm.

When the forger turns around, he’s surprised to see Arthur actually looks concerned, like he might possibly be worried about more than just the structural soundness of their vehicle—like he’s possibly burdened by thoughts of Eames hurting himself.

Eames reminds his drunken brain not to read to much into it. Arthur has a carefully crafted itinerary and schedule that he doesn’t want the unpredictable forger-slash-extractor mucking up.

"I’ll be back in two shakes of a lamb’s tail, my beloved," Eames says in that overly flirtatious way he knows drives Arthur mad.

Like clockwork, Arthur scowls, Eames grins, and then leaves the cabin.

***

Worse than crashing the truck was the look Arthur gave him when he had to track down the vehicle, tear open the door, and drag Eames’ sorry figure from the driver’s seat. Eames will never fully be able to reconstruct what happened, exactly, but he remembers a sudden turn in the road, and then landing in a ditch.

"You idiot," Arthur growls at him. He remembers that part clearly, as he remembers the painful, short walk back to the cabin when every breath was like fire.

"Hurts," he complains, wishing he was far more intoxicated, as he leans on Arthur for support.

"Your ribs are probably broken. You’ll be lucky if you don’t puncture your lungs."

Eames rolls his eyes.  _Arthur_. Ever the bloody optimist.

When they’re back inside, Arthur throws down some blankets and pillows on the floor, and when he notices Eames staring at him cockeyed, he gestures towards the hearth. “For when I get the fire going. You’ll be close to it.”

The forger nods a bit. Maybe he’s an optimist after all. Eames lumbers over to the nest and eases down to the floor. “Fuck, fuck,  _fuck_ ,” he gasps as he lays down on his back.

"This is just  _great_ , Eames,” Arthur mutters. “What the hell are we supposed to do with you now? We’ll have to cancel the job.”

He quickly shoots the other man a glare. “What’re you on about? All I have to do is lay there beside the PASIV. We’re not cancelling anything.”

Arthur clearly wants to keep arguing, but he doesn’t. Instead, he gathers his files and stacks them neatly out of the way before he kneels in front of the fireplace and resumes toiling. Eames folds an arm behind his head, and attempts not to visibly wince when even that small amount of movement causes a jolt of pain to travel up his side. He watches Arthur struggle dutifully, ever the tireless worker, and contemplates the fact that the man looks exactly as he did when he met him all those years ago.

Eames can’t say the same about himself. He definitely feels older, and has packed on a few pounds during his global battle against decency, soberness, and morality. 

"So who’re you seeing now?" he asks, bolstered by the knowledge Arthur probably wouldn’t strike an injured and vulnerable friend.

Arthur sighs in frustration—perhaps at the fire that refuses to burn, but most likely at Eames’ prying questions. “No one,” he answers succinctly and resumes scratching the stones together. “You don’t have a lighter? I thought you smoke.”

"Quit for Lent," Eames lies cheekily. The truth is he quit because Arthur complained that the smell of smoke gives him headaches.

Arthur smirks and throws down the stones in surrender. 

***

Eames is miserable. At night, Verkhoyansk is somehow even colder, and without a fire, the cabin is freezing. He shakes uncontrollably beneath the blankets, which in turn rattles his fractured ribs. He can’t sleep, and so he stares in misery at the ceiling, trying to mentally will the minutes to move faster towards daylight.

Quite unexpectedly, Arthur lays down beside him, squirms his way beneath the blankets, and carefully wraps an arm around him. Eames is so shocked that he makes a soft sound of surprise, which causes Arthur to freeze. “Shit, sorry. Did I hurt you?”

"What? No. What’re you doing?" Eames babbles, trying to reconcile the concepts of  _Arthur_ and  _cuddling_ in his mind.

"We’ll be warmer this way," Arthur says reasonably, which is logical and practical and so totally Arthurian that Eames immediately accepts it as an answer. The point man rubs his good side in slow, comforting circles, and after a bit, he actually does feel a bit warmer.

He nods and lays paralyzed on his back, afraid to move and spook Arthur or something. Seeing this side of the point man is so foreign and bizarre that Eames can’t help relish every moment like an explorer in the safari.  _Notice the survival instincts of the elusive point man. See the way he mimics human compassion_.

They’re quiet for a long time, and Eames is reasonably sure Arthur isn’t able to sleep either, but those suspicions are confirmed when the man finally speaks. “You were always right about David,” he admits softly, but he sounds so sad that Eames can’t feel victorious.

He sighs softly, mindful not to expand his chest too dramatically. “You’ll find someone else,” he says quietly.

Arthur laughs mirthlessly. “Yeah, I doubt that.”

Eames is surprised by the surge of anger and sadness he feels at those words. He hates David. He hates David for being passive-aggressive and cruel to Arthur, and spooking him from the idea that someone could ever love him properly. “He’s a wanker, darling. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

When Arthur grows quiet, he wonders if he’s the first person to ever tell Arthur it’s not his fault the relationship fell apart. “He says I work too much,” he says finally, whispering the words as though they’re a confession he’s kept to himself a very long time.

"Of course you work a lot," Eames scoffs, "You’re the best. Everyone wants to work with you." 

Arthur is quiet, and Eames is beginning to wonder if perhaps he fell asleep, when he looks over and sees Arthur is still awake, but his gaze is downcast. “Hey,” Eames says softly, and though he can’t really move, he brings his hand up to brush the backs of his fingers against Arthur’s cheek.

When Arthur looks up, there are tears in his eyes, and Eames feels a sharp tightening in his chest that has nothing to do with his damaged ribs. Arthur must see the concern on his face because he smiles in that little, self-deprecating way Eames hates that means he’s discarding his own feelings because he considers himself  _in the way_. “Sorry. Fuck, m’sorry,” he sniffs.

Eames shushes him, and pushing aside fears of pain and ruptured lungs, he rolls slowly to his side so he can see Arthur better. “What’s wrong, hm?” He reaches up again to carefully brush a tear from Arthur’s cheek that has escaped before the point man could help it.

Arthur shakes his head a little, and the forger waits quietly—knowing Arthur simply has to push past concerns of  _unprofessionalism_. Finally, the other man looks at him and sighs softly. “Don’t you get lonely?”

Eames lifts a shoulder in a weak shrug. “Sometimes,” he says for the sake of honesty. Being with Arthur in a cabin in a remote part of Russia did drive home the point that he has very few people in his life with whom he can be totally honest. There’s the old Inception team, and Arthur specifically, of course. But beyond that, Eames has never had a long-term relationship. He doesn’t want to fall in love with someone who he has to lie to all the time.

Eames has no family, and he knows for a fact Arthur doesn’t either. That’s why they arrive on Cobb’s doorstep every holiday like emotional refugees.

"David says I’m unlovable," Arthur adds quietly, his arm tightening a bit around Eames’ waist at the memory. The forger makes a mental note to pay the accountant a visit once the job is done in Russia and his ribs are healed. 

"He’s wrong," Eames says immediately—maybe too firmly, judging by the way Arthur looks up quickly. Sometimes he gets a little heated when it comes to the topic of Arthur. He tries a second time, this time softening his tone. "He’s _wrong_ , Arthur.”

Arthur only has to lean forward a couple inches to press their lips together, and it seems like the most natural thing in the world for Eames to cup the side of his face, tilt his head, and deepen the embrace. Arthur is a good kisser—excellent, actually, and Eames is so pleased that he’s briefly angry with them both that they haven’t been doing this for ages. He thinks of all the boring jobs over the years that could have been spiced up by snogging Arthur. 

He nips Arthur’s lower lip gently when they part, and winces when the point man accidentally presses against his ribs. “Fuck, m’sorry,” Arthur whispers and kisses him again, and the small sign of affection is so effortless and familiar that Eames feels giddy. 

"Don’t be sorry," he says, tired, and in pain, but happy—undeniably happy. "What the hell took you so bloody long?" he grins saucily, lightly touching Arthur’s lips. He entirely forgets about his ribs when the point man kisses his fingertips.  _Why hasn’t it always been this way?_

Arthur shrugs, smiling sheepishly. “We didn’t like each other, and then we did, but I thought we were just friends. I thought that’s all you wanted.”

Eames blinks slowly. “My endless flirting didn’t clue you in?”

He finds himself smiling along with Arthur when the other man erupts in laughter—wonderful dimples, and all, on display. “I don’t know, Eames. I didn’t take that seriously,” he shrugs slightly. “I didn’t think someone like you would want someone like me.”

That notion sobers him.  _Someone like me_. Eames would kill for someone like Arthur. He’d be  _lucky_  to have a man like him. Eames doesn’t understand how people can be in the same room with Arthur and not make him the center of attention.  Every day, fools pass Arthur on the street and don’t realize they’ve just encountered the most extraordinary creature they’re ever likely to meet during their brief time on the planet.

"Arthur," he says quietly, their gazes locking. He reaches up to touch his face again, and he wishes there was some magical string of words he could utter that would make Arthur understand how special and amazing he is. But all he can think to say is: "I want you, darling. I’ve always wanted you."

Apparently, it’s enough. Arthur’s smile is glowing and beautiful, and Eames is almost a little sorry to kiss it from his lips. But only a little.

**Author's Note:**

> follow me! http://theaoidos.tumblr.com/


End file.
